


Almost blue

by Zeta_Mei



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Brienne is ...a mermaid? a fish?, Forget CANON characters age, Forget Canon, I don't even know how to tag it, Jaime's a 5 yo child, Ponyo/Dory AU, She's 4 yo at the beginning, Why Did I Write This?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:22:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27900712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zeta_Mei/pseuds/Zeta_Mei
Summary: "The day he thought that his mother had died in giving birth to baby Ty, Jaime Lannister met a weird girl, cried all his tears, almost drowned in a beautiful bridal dress and went to the shore.Not exactly in this order, probably, but he was only five and a bit too shocked, afterwards, to recall any stupid detail of the “dream”, as his father insisted to call it."This folly is a Ponyo/Dory AU set in the Lannisport Marine Life Institut (which is, more or less, the Westerosi version of Monterey Bay Aquarium + Genoa Aquarium) --- my contribution for the J/B Festive Festival Exchange 2020.Warning: strong abuse of italics and of the world "blue", along with many mistakes, all mine.Hope you enjoy, any comment/correction is more than welcome.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister & Brienne of Tarth, Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 14
Kudos: 32
Collections: JB Festive Festival Exchange 2020





	Almost blue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [auntie_social](https://archiveofourown.org/users/auntie_social/gifts).



> This is for auntie_social, who sent me some great prompts (thanks):  
> 1\. Solarpunk  
> 2\. A really great dress (for anyone, messing with gender is my jam too!)  
> 3\. Aquariums (particular vibe: Monterey Bay Aquarium)
> 
> I was tempted by a modern AU romance in Winterfell Vertical Wood, but Monterey Bay Aquarium 💖💖💖 !!! Sea and sea creatures, awww... Hope I won't disappoint you, Auntie, have a nice Holiday time and a great 2021 start

The day he thought that his mother had died in giving birth to baby Ty, Jaime Lannister met a weird girl, cried all his tears, almost drowned in a beautiful bridal dress and went to the shore.

Not exactly in this order, probably, but he was only five and a bit too shocked, afterwards, to recall any stupid detail of the “dream”, as his father insisted to call it. Jaime wasn't sure it had been a dream, but he was sure about one thing at the very least.

He was _absolutely_ born to wear the long, white, perlescent gown his mother had worn in her wedding day.

It had been fluctuating around him in the water, gorgeously, borrowing the shape of water and its salty taste, as if it was made of water itself and not of silk and lace, transparent and beautiful and spotted with pearls that shone in the moonlight like rows and rows of iridescent cilias - and Jaime had finally ceased to weep, because he was a jelly, now, floating in the deep blue, like the wonderful jelly with the impossible name that uncle Gerion had showed him at the Aquarium.

No weight, no brain, no heart, no hurt. Only water and beauty, beauty and water.

A pity water burned like fire when it began to fill Jaime's lungs. It was shockingly painful, and decisively unfair. If the ugly child who danced and spun around him could breath underwater, why couldn't Jaime, who was Tywin Lannister's son, Cersei Lannister's twin and the greatest junior fencer-to-be of all Westeros? Jaime spat and coughed his soul and his anger on the rough sand, and obviously scolded, indignant and fierce like a soaked cat, the strange, little thing armored in blue and pink scales who had dared to fought both tide and undercurrent to bring him back on the shore, without even presenting herself like a proper sea lady or, worse, without even chanting a spell to gift him a couple of easy gills.

What a rude, odd, inconstant creature. She took offense, glaring at him with eyes as deep as the abysses, and gave him a head-butt only to lick away the blood pouring from his upper lip immediately after the blow had sent him belly-up - her tongue being smooth like a real girl's one, but salty and absurdly gentle.

“I'm Jaime”, he said, then, meekly, having never been taught by the maester about how a boy is supposed to behave when he's caught off guard by a ...mermaid? Not a mermaid, she was surely not a mermaid. No more, at least. She had grown legs like a wench, long and pale and still a bit blue, but undoubtely they were human legs, even if it was blatant she had no idea how using them.

She was the most awkward of awkward turtles, and he had to help her on her giant, bare feet. Gods, if she was tall, taller than him, but he was older, he was sure about it. She couldn't be more than four, judging from how quickly her mood passed from scorn to delight when she noticed he was grinning like an idiot.

“Brienne!”, she replied, her voice ringing like a thousand Sevenmas bells. “Brienne loves sand! Sand is squishy! And Brienne loves Jaime!”, she sang, hopping on the shoreline, her hands wet and pleasantly warm in Jaime's, and the bells became a million or even more, jingling and tinkling their merriness directly into his throat and his still aching chest, coloring the dusk like molten-golden notes – till someone shouted Jaime's name and Brienne blinked, twice, suddenly pale, abandoning his hands to the cold of the evening - and the waves did steal her, wrapping her in their hateful, black cloak, laced with silvery foam.

* * *

The “dream” didn't hint at fading in Jaime's mind.

Yet the time slipped though his fingers like dry sand, his mother recovered from the C-section that had almost killed her and made Jaime cut his hair in uncle Tygett's favorite style, while Tyrion began babbling his first words and then started even waddling on those short legs of his, strong-willed and brave like the blue child, who had completely disappeared.

No matter how long Jaime stared at the sea from his window, she never came back. Probably she had a stern, omnipresent, possessive father, like Jaime's. Or maybe she had simply forgotten him, you can never know with a, ugh, girl and, mostly, with a sea girl who can change her skin like you change your clothes. No, she hadn't forgotten him, she couldn't be a liar.

 _Not with those limpid eyes of hers,_ Jaime decided, and gave baby Ty another trustful, inviting look.

“B-Brienne”, said finally Tyrion clinging at the net of his red playpen, filled till the edge with fluffy dragons and plushy lions, and Jaime burst into laugh, clapping his hands with all the strength he had.

“Appropriate”, snorted Cersei, her face twisted in a grimace that made her look a precocious teen. “A stupid name on a stupid's mouth.”

“Ty is the cleverest toddler ever”, Jaime replied, covering his brother's small ears. “Surely he's cleverer than you, Cersei.”

“Than me?”, Cersei sneered, smiling a bad smile, while Tyrion was having a good time with one of Jaime's thumbs. “Don't think so. Surely he's cleverer than you, anybody is cleverer than the visionary donkey you've become after having drank so much salt water, Jaime.”

“Hee-haw!”, Jaime snapped, glancing down at his thumb and hand, sticky with charming spit bubbles.

“Hee-haw!”, Ty repeated, beaming like the loveliest and wickedest baby of all times, and Cersei glared at them both, horrified, before slamming the door so hard that even the half deaf Septa fell from the rocking chair where she was nicely asleep, the poor one.

From that moment, she - Cersei, not the Septa – quit slipping into Jaime's bed, so he started sneaking in Tyrion's chamber because Tyrion listened to all his stories, included the ones with scales and bridal dresses, in such a devoted way that he could forgive his little brother some karate blows or the occasional smell of poo.

* * *

Tyrion's second birthday had to be special, so Jaime had asked and obtained to go all together in the most special place of all Westerlands, the jewel of the Sunset Bay, the great Lannisport Marine Life Institute, that were a good number of words to say it was a fantastic aquarium.

At its entrance, aunt Briony was beaming, her hand on uncle Gerion's arm and, to Jaime's surprise, her belly was big and smooth as the mouth of a whale shark. It took a lot to do all the _greeting and hugging_ stuff among the proud director of the aquarium and his large family, with Cersei playing the perfect little lady and Tyrion sinking between aunt Genna's enormous breasts with a sparkle in his mismatched eyes. A very looong time, because with adults it works like that, you can never skip the boring part and go directly to see the pools - " _the exhibits, Jaime darling, there are no mere pools or tanks filled with fishes, here we believe in rescue, rehabilitation and release"_ \- so when the Lannister troop stopped in front of the Aquarium diner, Jaime's heart skipped a beat. The last time he had been forced in a restaurant with his kin, he had to sit for two endless hours at aunt Dorna's side and aunt Dorna was sweet and kind, but Jaime really had no intention of learning any of her knitting tricks, for the moment.

Luckily, grandpa Tytos claimed Johanna and all the women for him, banishing all the others from the restaurant, so Jaime found himself already galloping towards the Open Sea exhibit, Tyrion's stroller quick and swift under his lead, until they got far enough from uncle Kevan's tireless supervision and, mostly, from clingy cousin Lancel or sly cousins Lyonel and Cleos.

“See, Ty? No more monsters in sight”, Jaime said, panting, eyes widened in full admiration of the incredible 90 feet window beyond which thousand and thousand of fishes of all colors swam and swirled. “Only blue.” He concluded, grinning. Blue was suddenly all around them, as if he and his brother were floating among huge school of glitttering sardines, big tunas and slender hammerhead sharks. A turtle, lazy and witty like cousin Devan, blinked at him, and it was utterly magic, until Jaime felt a tug and a whine.

“Not now, Ty", he groaned.

“B-Brienne.”

The snotty child caught all Jaime's attention. His green eye was clearly sincere, his dark one seemed just pleased, and yet... it simply couldn't be. Jaime left the stroller handle to stick his face to the window in the way that was absolutely _prohibited_ , but there she was.

Brienne.

Smaller than Tyrion's hand even considering her flag-shaped tail, with bright yellow scales and blue spots by her eyes, her very big, very blue, eyes. She looked very alike a baby regal tang, only very clumsy and idiotically restless, vibrating like an excited electric eel behind the thick wall of glass. She dared a smile and it came out crooked and girlish and a bit shy - it was her, Brienne. Undoubtedly.

Suddenly the pool seemed small and somehow sad.

“They caught her and put her in this... jail”, Jaime burst out, stuffing his hands in his pockets and finding only the half-chewed gum Addam had gifted him, Holy Moly. “Tyrion, Tyrion, what should I do, now?”

“Go,” the toddler answered, exploring with his index-finger the left nostril of the snub nose he had inherited from great-grandma Rohanne, who was grandpa Tytos' mother and the undisputed head of the family.

“Go?”

Tyrion snorted, impatient, looking ready to hit his brother with one of his green-yellowish bogeys. A serious threat, 'cause he had an excellent aim, for a two-years old. “Go get her,” the scowling toddler explained, nodding at the sea pail hanging from the stroller.

“Uh. Ok.”

It sounded foolish, it sounded great. Provided that Jaime could reach the edge of the pool and the big ispection opening at its top and... why not? The maintenance scaffolding shone a metallic, accomplice shine, and Tyrion could surely manage all by himself for a while, he was no more a baby, he had even begun the toilet training - with scarce results, but that was not the point.

Without wasting other precious instants in such a useless thing like reasoning, Jaime started the climb, rung after rung, and then leaned from the inspection opening. Brienne was already waiting for him, she had just to jump in the bucket, and she did it! The little, sweet wench-fish of his. That part of the business went really easy, just like breathing. Climbing down was more difficult, because the water had no intention to stay good and quiet inside the pail, but preferred to slosh and splash round Jaime's legs and Brienne risked to fall - and no, it was better not to think what might happen to her if she fell from that height.

Jaime's knees were a bit wobble, as he finally landed, not too far from the point where he had left Tyrion on his troller.

“See Brie? I did it!”, he whispered, smiling.

“Jaime! Brienne loves Jaime!”, she bubbled, her tail moving as fast as Jaime's heart.

“Ssssh, don't be such a Brienne, Brienne. One can love ham or sand or whatever but a girl can't love a boy, 'cause boys and girls are sworn enemies, you should know,” he warned her, raising his brow as she spitted water at him, the unruly sea creature. He had to put the bucket on the floor and remove his jacket to wipe all the water off his face, and still his hair looked damp and messy. “Stop making all that noise, they can ear us.” And for _they_ , Jaime didn't intend only the guard in blue-and-gray uniform that was looking at him suspiciously, but mostly green-eyed or weasel-looking people.

“Hear whom?”, Cleos said, popping out from nowhere, a vacuous look on his chinless face. He was a couple of years older than Jaime, but Jaime was smarter.

“Aunt Genna, who else?”, the golden-haired boy replied, covering Brienne's bucket with his jacket.

“Nah, mom's at the diner, now.”

“That's what she wanted us to know, but the truth is that mom and dad convinced her to start a new no-sugar and no-meat diet”, Jaime asserted, very solemn. “I just saw her wandering with a veggie stick in each hand.”

Cleos paled, as if he had been struck by some lethal arrows or he had been violently unhorsed. The last time auntie had tried to give up chocolate to lose weight, her husband and sons had had a long holiday at the Twins, and only Gods knew how much guests were cold-treated by the lovely Frey patriarch.

“I-I presume I'm going to look for Lyonel and Willelm”, Cleos decided, skulking away with his tail between his legs.

Jaime felt almost guilty about him. Almost. He was more relieved and proud of himself, in truth. Smiling at Brienne, he ran to reach for Tyrion, and that was his worst mistake. Cersei was there, with Lancel clung to her like a blond limpet.

“Where have you been, my beloved twin?”, the girl inquired, waving her hand to someone, to uncle Gerion walking in their direction, probably. “What's in the bucket?”

“Brienne!”, Tyrion shouted, thrilled, not noticing Jaime's desperate signs.

“Let me see”, Cersei ordered in her best bossy tone, but that tone had no impact on Jaime. He just kept the green pail, holding it even tighter to his chest. “Is that a goldfish?”, she inquired, unsatisfied, after a quick glance.

“A _yellow and blue_ goldfish?” Brienne bubbled a chuckle, Tyrion made out an amused burp and even Lancel showed a glimmer of intelligence as he hinted at smiling, notwithstanding Cersei's warning scowl.

“Don't use that mocking voice with me, Jaime Lannister”, she added, narrowing her emerald eyes, so cold in the azurine light seeping from the aquarium. “You're in a trouble, aren't you? And for the ugliest fish I've ever seen in my entire life.”

Not appreciating the comment, Brienne spitted water on the new, gorgeous dress Cersei was wearing - and the pride and beauty of Casterly Rock freaked out, just a bit. Shouts and stomping feet, no more than this. Jaime and Tyrion weren't impressed at all, Cersei could do worse, but obviously it was enough to make uncle Gerion hurry toward them, and obviously the vexed queen clung to nuncle's leg and then obviously nuncle scolded Jaime, scolded even an utterly confused Lancel, just to be sure, and what was worse and totally unfair, director Gerion took the green pail _and Brienne with it_ – without even trying to understand she was _Brienne_ and not only a stolen fish among thousand and thousand fishes, his mouth repeating the same senseless, monotone, cruel word: quarantine, quarantine, quarantine...

* * *

They had brought her in the quarantine zone.

Jame waited for the right moment, and soon it came. While everybody was taking pictures of Tyrion drawing a crooked T on a birthday cake which was decisively bigger than him, Jaime sneaked out from the party hall decorated with ballons and bio-plastic crabs, having no idea of what to do and not even a sea pail, having only the map he had borrowed from a very happy (and very drunk) uncle Stafford. Leaned on the staircase walls, invisible like the Faceless Girl of the legends, Jaime reached the exact point signaled in the map like "SERVICE AREA", wishing to have Addam's presence of mind or Lyle's strength to force open the “DO NOT ENTER” door that was separating him from Brienne.

He was on the verge to build a trebuchet to throw himself inside through the fanlight above the stupid door when it came into his mind to try pulling the door, instead of pushing, and well, it worked – so, no matter if he had improvised a bit, Jaime had done a very good work and could declare his siege ended without casualties, apart his pride, but there was no need of telling Brienne about it.

She was a cool girl, in the end, and cool girls don't need details such as “ _I suck in reading because sometimes letters get confused on the board_ ” or compliments such as “ _your eyes are bluer than the ocean itself._ ” To be completely honest, Jaime had no clue of what a cool girl needed or liked, but surely Brienne wanted to be free, that was plain and he was there to help her getting back to the waves or coming back with him to the Rock - if she wished to. Only if she wished to, but why shouldn't she wish to come to the Rock for a visit? They had ton of visitors every moon, because it was a very important and very historical place, the only fortress which could resist to the Dragon Queen in times of old. Ideal for cool girls with long legs which surely run very quickly up and down the stairs while playing at monsters-and-maidens, so the first thing Jaime had to ask her was to bring back those pale legs of hers, for a while, at least.

Admitted he would have found her.

The quarantine zone was large and gloomy: gray tiles, high scaffolds and empty fish tanks. He had expected it to be quite different – more ...scientific, whatever the word scientific meant. Scientific was one of uncle Gerion's favorite expressions, along with _respect for sea life_ and _conservation_ and ...what else? _Rescue, rehabilitation and release_. Aunt Briony must be a very patient woman, or probably she shared her husband's passion for the sea, since she was the aquarist who usually fed sevengill and leopard sharks with her ow hands - when she was not carrying baby Lannisters, of course. How a woman could prefer a baby bump to sharks, well, this was simply one of the absurdities of the absurd world of adults, like hugs and kisses, ugh. 

“Brienne?”, Jaime's lips suddenly let out. There was a brightness, a shine, in a tank not so far. “Brienne, I've found you, again.” He reached her, drummed his fingers on the glass and giggled when she swirled in a mass of tiny bubbles and blue freckles.

“Jaime!”, she intoned. “Wanna stay with you.”

He minced, barely containing a laugh. “Ok, but it would be easier if you could, If you'd liked to...”, he put down the map, because it isn't easy to speak with a crumpled map in your sweaty hand while a wench-fish looks at you that way. “Couldn't you do some magic? Like that time, on the shore.”

“Oh”, she simply replied, jumping above the surface of the water to leave a peck on his forehead. A small, wet _kiss_. Embarrassing, but not too much, maybe - Jaime felt strange, and soft, dropping onto the floor like an old rag, his clothes suddenly too large and useless. He rubbed his eyes, his incredibly large eyes with four of his eight hands, only he had no hands, only arms or, better, tentacles. Red, long, squiddy tentacles, plenty of... how do they call them those circular, pale, bow-like hideous things?

“You changed me into a octopus!”, he snapped, as soon as he rgained Brienne's tank. She blinked, and water filled Jaime's gills and blood pulsed in all his three hearts – three? He felt three beats in the same time and almost fainted for the shock, with the idiotic regal blue tang already ready to hold him with her ridicolously gentle fins. “A dumb, hideous octopus!”, he repeated, weak as a mollusk. “You, son, not, daughter of a seastar!”

“Mommy and daddy aren't seastar”, she answered, the blue spots by her eyes becoming suddenly very scornful, “and octopuses are smart and they can go wherever they want and be whatever they want.”

“Oh, now you can say more than a word or two, good. Tell me, what am I supposed to do with eight arms and no hands?”

“Whatever you want”, she repeated, stubborn like a mule-fish. “Just stay far from me. I'm no playing with you anymore.”

“That's... that's unfair, wench!”

“What's a wench?”, she turned again towards him, so rapidly that he went green-blue. Then again a pretty crimson, it was thrilling the way he could change his color.

“A wench is a helpless girl which offers milk and cocoa cookies to the brave boy who saves her”, Jaime answered readily, recalling perfectly Arthur's definition of wenches and with Arthur Dayne, well, you can be sure. He was ten, Arthur, he had read entirely the reduced version of the _Cronycles of Knights and Ladies and Ladies Knights_ written by Sam the Slayer and once he had even made Jaime play with his white and long and heavy and beautiful sword, the best you can create with a Starfall 3D printer.

Clearly impressed by Jaime's display of wits, Brienne reddened or, better, became a very bright yellow, before trying to bite at him.

As if she could. Stupid wench-fish, Jaime now had eight arms and he found out that he could use all of them very well and very fast. He raised two of his arms in a terrific arch, tentacles met fins of steel, and she was terribly fast, she too, and managed to disantangle herself, even when he pinned her against the fake rock. When Jaime felt a blow upon his eye, he plunged and got to hit her tail, but somehow she was again above him, unyielding and surprisingly strong, still ready to fight, when they heard a voice.

“It's all fine, sweetheart.” The intruder talking at the cell phone wore, under a green unbuttoned lab coat, a bat-woman shirt with some writings in italics, but they hadn't still begun learning italics at school. “No, I'm sure Cat didn't do it expressly, and sure, you can invite Petyr, a pic-nic maybe, if daddy... No, Lysa, daddy likes Petyr, I'm sure he likes Petyr, may I speak with him, please? Thanks, Lysa, of course I miss you.”

“Get behind me,” Jaime whispered to Brienne, but the impossible wench-fish didn't hint at obeying, until it was too late.

“Hos? For Gods' sake, Hos, stop being a child with the children”, the lady stopped just in front of their tank, gesticulating, her high cheekbones suffused of a vague blush. “No, Hos, sorry but I don't think it's a tragedy if a five years old has kissed both our daughters. No, you won't disturb Mr. and Mrs. Baelish for such a... You can invite Petyr, instead. Oh, it sounds really nice. A pic-nic on the Blue Fork or in Pennytree to see the old oak. You have such terrific, original ideas, trouty. Now I have to greet you, I have still to prepare the transfer, it seems they're going to send us even a young octopus... A common red octopus, nothing special”, Brienne made out a weird sound, too alike a laugh for Jaime's taste, and the woman was very close to the tank, now. “But he looks nice and healthy. Think, his eyes are quite... green. Curious, isn't it?”

“Nice? Curious?”, Jaime burst out, climbing on the edge of the glass and the woman stepped backward in shock. “Can't you recognize a lion from a squid? I'm Jaime Lannister, the Prime Minister's son!”

“Now I really have to leave you, Hoster. 'bye”, the intruder said, putting her mobile in one of the giant bags she was carrying. Her eyes were large, brown as a chestnut. Even if she was far from being as beautiful as Johanna Lannister, she was pretty with her flaming red hair tied in a high pony-tail, and reminded Jaime of his mother, somehow. Probably it was because of her smile, a bit hesitant but warm as a sunny day.

“My name's Jaime and I'm seven and a half. Almost a man grown”, he added, no more angry. “And the ugly wench-fish below is Brienne. She changed me into an octopus and she's too stubborn to give me back my skin.”

“Ok, we can work it out maybe”, the woman made out a brief sigh, but her smile widened, calm and comforting. “I'm Minisa, I'm thirty-two, I work in the Riverlands Aquarium with my husband Hoster. I like every marine creature but I like children even more. So, Jaime, you're seven and a half. I guess these clothes are yours, aren't they?” She picked up Jaime's jeans from the floor, then turned gently towards Brienne, her voice soft as a thistle flower. “And you, honey? How old are you?”

“In human terms?”, the little wench-fish replied, shyly.

“Uh. Yes, honey, in human terms, if it's not a problem.”

“Six,” Brie murmured, shooting a puzzled glance at Jaime. “Almost.”

“My sweet Lysa is also six,” the woman commented, prideful. For what Jaime had eavesdropped Brienne had more wits in her tail than what that Lysa might desire in all her life, but even a rockfish is lovely for mommy rockfish, so he decided to keep his mouth well shut. “Tell me, Brienne”, continued the kind woman, “could you be so nice to change again Jaime into a boy?”

The wench-fish lowered her eyes. “Dunno”, she confessed in a soft gurgle. “Dad says I shouldn't and it doesn't always work, not when you're tired.”

“So you're tired, honey?” Mrs. Minisa asked, and Brienne nodded. For the first time, Jaime noticed the way the little wench-fish tended to swim always a bit too much towards the fake rock in the middle of the tank, as if she would have enjoyed to lean at it and have a nap. She was not even six, in the end - and magic is wearying, it was known. “What about trying, honey, only once?”

“Ok.” Brienne answered, drifting her glance. “If Jaime stops mocking me”, she added, the ungrateful wench-fish.

“I'm sure Jaime didn't intend to hurt you, and he isn't going to mock you anymore.”

As usual the fault was Jaime's. Brienne had changed him into an octopus, but the fault was his, because she was a girl and he was a boy, and older than her. “Oh no, I'm not going to apologize to the enemy only because she's as thick as an aquarium glass”, he stated, crossing six of his arms. “I do prefer remaining an octopus. Having three hearts is fantastic, in the end.”

The way Brienne became a startling tone of yellow amused him a lot, the way she turned, stiff as a dried cod, was less funny, however. It moved something inside him, something dork, unexpected.

"Fine. How about a truce? Even sworn enemies find a truce, sometimes", proposed Mrs. Minisa, hopeful.

Jaime sighed. "I suppose I might stand a truce... a brief one, and only because you're a cute enemy, Brie." The wench-fish glanced at him, hesitant. “A very cute enemy. And strong. I like the way you fight, not bad.”

 _Not bad for a girl of almost six,_ he'd wanted to specify, but he wasn't able to go on. Not with a wench-fish swimming right into his arms.

"Brienne loves truces", she burbled softly, wrapping her fins around his face, and Jaime felt again warm and weird, until he felt more embarrassed then warm but still weird, because he was naked like his nameday and clearly too big to keep staying in an awful quarantine tank. Brienne was naked too, the water dripping on the floor from her palms and her elbows, while she stared at her toes, like if she was counting them.

"Ten. They're ten," she proclaimed, with the enthusiasm of a beginner.

She had really counted her toes, to Jaime's dismay. As he raised an eyebrow, ready to scoff at her, the girl dared a clumsy smile, the pale hair stuck to her forehead barely concealing a prairie of freckles, rose and red and apparently smooth like petals.

 _Petals? Too much magic is dangerous for neurons_ , the boy decided, and quickly twisted on his heels, to spare himself from the odd spectacle of Brienne's crooked milk teeth and the even odder spectacle of the plain girl struggling into a ridiculous pink dress that Mrs. Minisa had bought for the eldest of her daughters, the one called like a cat.

It took them a century or maybe more to get ready, but in the end they left that horrible place, directed to the center of the universe, that was where Jaime's kin was surely still banqueting and toasting with the excuse of Ty's birthday.

* * *

Having back his fingers was nice. Fingers were useful, for instance to prevent Brienne from falling asleep right when things were rushing to disaster. Not that the girl might ever understand his noble intentions. She startled, dazed and vexed, when Jaime pinched her.

“Leave Brienne in peace, Jaime”, said quietly Johanna Lannister, rocking a speechless Cersei in her lap. “No time for pranks.”

The boy's green eyes went wide for the amazement. The sky was really going to crumble on their heads, if even his mother was going to join the very crowded club of people who enjoyed misunderstanding Jaime Lannister. For sure, Tywin Lannister was its honorary president, judging from the stiff, cold way he was talking to uncle Gerion, Mrs Minisa and her bald and bold assistant, a certain Mr. Robin Rygers who blatantly resembled a bonito, pretending they all were on a golf lawn, discussing of politics and not of the fishes and jellies that were swimming all around them.

At least, the other Lannisters had the decency of sitting quiet and frozen like the rest of the aquarium visitors, with two remarkable exceptions. The first was Tyrion, too busy in trying to catch a hermit crab in the touch pool to notice the oddity of the enormous blue whales and giant octopuses, made of waves and foam, who were climbing on the aquarium walls.

Great-grandma Rohanne looked also perfectly at ease, as usual. Clad in silk and sparkling glitters, she drove at first her wheeling chair amidst a school of frightened herrings and, then, towards a slow, indifferent ray to tickle its large gray wings, strictly followed by her best friend Nan and by Nan's worried great-grandson Walder, seven feet of goodness and smiles, unable to contain the two crones, who were squawking like silly gals of seventeen, as if it were perfectly normal to see any sort of sea creatures pass through the glasses and float in midair.

 _Adults are so strange, and females are definitely a mystery,_ pondered Jaime, squeezing Brienne's hand. She started again but didn't scowl, this time. She made out a shy smile instead, soon suffocated by a yawn - she yawned nicely, full open mouth, like an anchovy.

“Listen, Brie”, he leaned towards her to whisper into her ear. “Have you got any clue of what's going on?”

She shrugged, stroking the back of a young catshark, no more than twenty inches long. “Father is surely angry.” She sighed, the catshark rolling around her arm in a purring twist, its eyes long and glowing a purple glow.

“Lord Selwyn is always angry with terrestrials, because of plastic and of toxic discharges, polluting the ocean” the catshark said, blunt, and Cersei groaned, nesting her golden head on their mother's breast.

“Gal!” The wench-fish yelled, scrambling on her feet because of this Gal. What a stupid name, Gal: among all names Jaime had ever heard, Gal was undoubtedly the stupidest one and he had a soft skeleton of cartilage when even a cod could boast true fish-bones.

“Galladon,” the catfish specified, correcting the wench, not unkindly. “I'm Brienne's brother, Jaime. Honored to welcome you into the family.”

Suddenly Galladon sounded like a nice name, ancient, noble, like Arthur.

“Into what?” Johanna broke in, looking a bit astonished, and she never looked astonished, normally.

“Our family. The Lady, Lord Selwyn, Brienne, me and the sisters. Alysanne, Arianne, Lysanne, Myrianne, Roxanne, Adrianne, Marcyanne...”

“Wait. How many sisters have you got?”

“Two hundred thousand and one, included Brie.”

“Oh.” Johanna didn't bother to mask her amazement, now.

“All beautiful,” proclaimed the catshark, haughty. Jaime couldn't help but whistle, glancing at Brienne and her irregular features. Maybe under the sea... “Included Brienne,” Galladon pointed out, sharply. His eyes didn't lose their elegant, elongated shape while the spotted skin changed gradually into soft and lavish clothes, until he gained the appearance of a handsome boy of nine years old, or even more. It wasn't easy to say, since he was that tall, decisively taller than Arthur Dayne and Arthur Dayne was Arthur Dayne.

“You should learn some tricks from your brother, Brie,” Jaime murmured to the wench, sneering. “Dresses are useful stuff, among us _terrestrials_.”

She blushed so acutely, that her brother glared Jaime once again.

“Don't care about Jaime. My son is too fond of the sound of his voice, sometimes.” Joanna's tone was calm, but determined. “Galladon, please, would you tell me why the sea is all above the aquarium, and even _inside_ the aquarium? I mean, is your lord father so angry that I should worry?”

The red-haired boy widened his violet eyes in surprise. "Worry? Why? Father may be angry but it's Mother, the Lady, who rules the sea, and the Lady loves the terrestrials, in the end, or she wouldn't have married one, I suppose."

"Is your father a terrestrial, Brie?", Jaime inquired, strangely pleased by the news.

She nodded. "He was a Tarth of Tarth."

Jaime's mother took a deep, sharp, noisy breath. "A Tarth? I-I have to talk a moment with great-grandma Rohanne. Can you wait here, children? And please, please Jaime, don't do or say anything without thinking about it for at least ten seconds, ok?"

* * *

The man had pale blond, almost silver, hair, like Brienne's, but long till his ankles - and a booming voice.

_One. Two. Three. Four._

Galladon seemed utmost embarrassed by his father's temper. Brienne seemed simply lost. Fragile. She didn't hint at shifting away as Jaime passed his arm around her waist.

_Five. Six. Seven._

Tall like Mrs. Nan's great-grandson, Lord Selwyn towered on Jaime's father, and was shouting at him.

_Eight. Nine._

"Here she is, your precious daughter", Brienne shuddered, as Jaime's father pointed at her while shouting back at the huge man dressed in blue velvet and corals."Nobody has raised a finger on her, to be precise it was your beloved sea princess to change my firstborn son into a dreadful squid, if we can give credit to this bat-rivergirl and to her sweet Robin. Now, Tarth, I'd be very glad and grateful if you would so nice to take your daughter back to your shell-and-sand castle and free Lannisport and my brother's aquarium from this... chaos."

_Ten._

Jaime kissed Brienne.

Because he had to, of course he had to.

Ignoring any basic rules of the eternal war between boys and girls, ignoring his friends' sneers which were resounding loud in his mind. And even if it was naught but a clumsy pressure, more on her peachy cheek than on her lips, it worked, and the salty taste of her skin became the salty taste of the water all around them, as they fell in the touch pool, in a sparkle of blue-and-yellow for her and bright red for him. A pity he was no more an octopus, but a small fish, smaller than her, and his right fin was ... very tiny, too tiny. Half-atrophied. How convenient.

“Sorry, Jaime”, his name trembled in her voice. “You know, I'm not as good as Gal...”, she added, her eyes big as blue baloons filled with stars.

He smirked. “It doesn't really matter, wench. I can manage.” He twirled on himself, just in time to see Tyrion's fingers advancing towards them. “We have to flee, now.”

“The pipes! The pipes bring to the open sea”, she said in a thrilled gurgle. “To Mother. She'll settle all things. Follow me, Jaime.”

She turned, to make certain he was following, the mistrustful wench-fish. Of course, he was following her, he would have followed her everywhere, even in the deep of that narrow tunnel, dark and threatening like an intricate wood - and so cold. Something frozen brushed Jaime's face, a seaweed, scary as a ghost's fingers, but a boy of almost eight can't be scared by a stupid seaweed.

Sharks are no seaweed, though. The pipe made a zig-zag, then Brienne, muttering a high and querulous tune, choose to go right towards a light-filled pool, risking to end practically into the jaws of a formidable duo of sharks. Well, formidable was an exaggeration. The sandbar shark had a very large but very thin, almost emaciated, dorsal fin and looked very old, even older than his neighbour, a big-bellied, rheumy-eyed horn shark.

However, without wasting precious time, Jaime pulled and yanked a particular stubborn wench-fish back into the pipe, not giving a fig about her absurd complains.

“But, they were just Illy and Creigh, two old and loyal servants of the Lady”, she went on, shaking her head, more abashed than angry. “And Pod told me there was a safe passage for the open sea at the bottom of their pool.”

Jaime rolled his eyes. “Who's this Pod, now?”

“My pipe pal. A nice beluga. He was convinced his biological sonars skill were on the fritz, but I proved him wrong.” She smiled a sweet, caring smile. “Pod can lead us safely outside these tunnels.”

“A beluga”, Jaime wasn't able to contain himself. “How did he look like when he was a boy, before you changed into a white, immaculate sea knight? Was he tall? Was he strong enough to win against you?”

She blinked. “Pod is gray, he has always been a beluga and beluga are brave and strong.”

“Brave. Strong. Have you grown really fond of this Pod, haven't you?”

“I have”, she confessed, bubbling. “Pod is special, he's like a younger brother for me, and he's so skilled for a three years old.”

“Three years old?” Jaime grinned. “So, you want me to follow the indications of a child? Slim chance.” With a laugh, he kept swimming in the dark, the wench-fish pleading and bleating at his side, until he saw a promising light on the left. “This way, Brie.”

She didn't hide a shiver. “Brienne doesn't like that light.”

“We made a truce, wench, and truces are built on trust,” he proclaimed, continuing along the dim tunnel. When he glimpsed back, he found her, swimming just behind him, yellow and blue and determined.

The pipe ended into a very large pool, so enlightened that Jaime's eyes needed a lot of time to get used to it, and when he finally was able to open his eyelids again, the first thing he saw was Brienne's eyes - too large and bright, even for her.

“Jaime, you can do it”, she murmured. “Clownfishes lives into anemones, so they're used to stings.”

“Have you really changed me into a _clownfish_?”, he drifted his glance, and found out the passage where they had just passed through. There was a jellyfish, a very pale and corpse-like one, notwithstanding the red stripes on its top.

Alarmed, Jaime spun and saw all the other jellies. Entire schools of jellies. Copper jellies with lacy arms long as braids, zebra striped jellies, squad jellies with large and thick bells, dark purple - almost brown - jellies characterized by thick, colored tentacles, and pale, moony jellies. Jaime swallowed hard, trying to remember if blue royal tangs were immune to jellyfish stings. Some ocean fishes and some sea turtles ate jellyfish, but Brienne was only a young reef fish. He swallowed again, and it tasted acid.

“Wench, what about a game?”

“A game?”

“When you can't go back, you have to worry only about the best way of moving forward, and the best way is bouncing on their stupid tops. Like that!”, Jaime hopped on the flat bell of a gorgeous spotted comb jelly. “Boing! Boing! See? The tops won't sting us!”

She bounced on the top of another jelly, smiling her bravest smile. “Brienne loves games.”

“Whoever can hop the fastest out of these jellyfish wins, but no one can touch the tentacles.”

“Ok. Ready?”

“Ready? I'm always ready to beat you! The true question is … are you hungry, wench?”

“Hungry?”

“Because you're going to eat my bubbles, whoo-hoo!” Jaime ducked to the left, dodged an iridescent tentacle coming from nowhere and bounced on a black sea nettle. “You gotta go faster if you want to reach me, Brie!” The crippled fin was doing a magnificent work. Jaime surpassed a couple of bubbler monsters, spying a little opening which, with a bit of luck, was leading to another pipe. “Two in a row, great!” He shifted, then suddenly the water around him was perfect and blue and empty - safe. “And the winner is... the clownfish! We did it, Brie! Look at us, we did it, we... Brie? Brie?” A hole took the place of his heart, when he realized to be alone. “Brienne!”

He smashed through the wall of jellies, ignoring the stings. Because he felt them, he felt them all, but he didn't care, he couldn't care. Then finally he found her, the tentacle of a hideous bloodybelly comb jelly wrapped around her head. It hurt terribly, but he freed her in the blink of an eye, bringing her where it was safe, safe.

“Brienne. Please, Brie.”

“Am I disqualified?” The tentacle had left a terrible red sign just below her right eye and all around her neck. 

“No, wenchy, you're doing fine, you're actually winning!”, he said, trying to keep his voice and his fins steady, even if his head was spinning. “But you have to stay awake. Tell me, who are you?”

“Brienne of the Sea, the Lady's heir. Not a wenchy,” she answered, her eyes now open, but glassy and distant.

“Why not? You know what good wenchies do?” 

“Brienne...”

“They do stay awake, Brie. Can you?” Jaime felt his scales burn, and the blue around him had become to turn black with iridiscent flashes.

“...loves...”

“Awake, Brie. A-”

...Jaime.”

“-wake. Please.” Jaime held her tighter, before the darkness swallowed them.

* * *

His lashes fluttered open, slowly. It must be a dream, nothing but a dream, because only in a dream a baby sea turtle would have called him dude.

“Focus, dude”, repeated the baby turtle which Jaime, in his mind, named Turtle n. 1.

“He lives!”, screamed Turtle n. 2.

“Hey dude. Nice to meet you”, said Turtle n. 1.

Turtle n. 3 shook her head. “You shouldn't call him dude.”

“Not after he has swam back into the jellies' pit to rescue Brienne”, affirmed Turtle n. 4, and Turtle n. 3 agreed vehemently.

“Such a romantic boy”, sighed Turtle n. 6, her lilac eyes sparkling.

“You're really smitten, aren't you, dude?”, asked the brazen Turtle n. 1.

“Of course, he is. I'll bet he has even dreamed of her”, giggled Turtle n. 6 or maybe it had been Turtle n. 2. At this point, Jaime was so dazed and worried that he had gone completely speechless.

“Ok, little sisters, that's enough. Now let the lad in peace, and go home”, said a known voice. Jaime would recognize everywhere those almond-shaped, purple eyes.

There were complains, but the small mass of baby turtles obeyed Galladon, leaving the big shell in which the goldfish was resting with a few, elegant moves of dance. They were really beautiful and elegant in the infinite blue of the open sea. Brienne's color.

“Brienne!”, he shouted, trying to lift himself. It wasn't that easy, even if someone had changed his atrophied fin with a good one and healed his wounds. “Where's Brienne?”, Jaime asked.

“With the Lady's elder brother”, Galladon answered, shifting uncomfortable in his shell. “He's very good in healing people, and there's also Mother with him. Brienne's surely fine, well, she'll be soon fine.”

The clownfish breathed deeply through his gills, and his chest ached like the first time he and the weird girl met. “It's all my fault. I-I... can I see her?”

“No way.” The long-haired giant loomed on the shell, his words so peremptory that Jaime felt his tiny heart crash against his fish-bones. “You've done too much for her already, I'd say. Grab Gal's shell. My son will bring you back to your family, giving you back your human form.”

A glance towards sea turtle Galladon told the pasty clowfish that there was nothing he could say or do to make Brienne's father change his mind, and probably the man was right. He had done enough. Now he had two fins of the same size, but Jaime had remained a cripple, somehow.

* * *

The huge profile of the Rock dominated the hills, as the electric car continued fast and quiet on the coastal road towards _home._ Both Cersei and Tyrion were asleep, and even Jaime's father was lightly snoring on the passenger seat, while his mother was driving and humming an old song of pools and maidens. One of Johanna's favorite. After a curve, a ray tickled Jaime's curls and nose and he sneezed, suddenly happy as a drunken sailor.

“Jaime.” The wench murmured. There was a question, a worry in her tone, in the way she pressed her palm on the back of the kid's hand. Now Casterly Rock and its Lion were in full sight, intimidating and gorgeous.

“It's just a castle”, he said, protective, shifting on the backseat to stay closer to the wench. It wasn't her fault if the dumb girl had never been on a car or in a true fortress.

She looked at him, smiling an uncertain smile. “Brienne loves Jaime's toy castle, but...” She hunched her shoulders and knitted her brows, as if speaking was a very difficult thing, and maybe it was for her, because of the scar left by that bloody monster on her right cheek, “... but are you really going to stay with _me,_ forever?”

He gave her a punitive hug, and he was awarded with a girlish gasp. A nice gasp, indeed, and she deserved to gasp all her human life long, and even after that. Jaime promised to himself to make sure she'd never lack a good gasp even underwater, when she would have come back to her duties of heir of the Sea Throne.

“Don't you remember, Brienne? I swore a oath, and I intend to keep my oath", he grinned as she became red as the waves in the sunset.

The same color the wench had when her Lady Mother had asked Jaime to swear, if he really wanted Brienne to stay with him.

  
  


  
  


It had been all so quick he hardly recalled all the passages. He remembered well to have lost the control of his jaw when great-grandma Rohanne had _walked_ towards him with long, imperative strides, in her glimmering green dress. She often dressed in green to enhance the color of her eyes, like she used to enhance her freckles with a crimson lipstick or to dye her hair in a weird shade of rose-red, claiming that was her natural color when she was still Miss Webber – but, in truth, it needed all Jaime's imagination to figure out a young strawberry-haired Rohanne giving orders to some beau... because she boasted of having had a lot of beaus in her youth, and she always liked giving orders.

“Where the hell were you, kid? Who taught you to make a Lady wait for you?”, she snapped, her friend Nan taking immediately Jaime's defense.

“He's just seven, Rory, can't treat him like you treat Ty or Ty or Ty.” The logical of the wrinkled woman from Winterfell had always represented a puzzle for Jaime, but she was funny, in the end.

“Seven or seventy, it doesn't matter. You can't make the Sea Lady wait.”

“I'll bet the boy has been delayed by Duncan's grandson.”

“Nan, sweetling, don't even dare to mention again that name in my presence or...”

“Who's Duncan?”, asked Jaime, trying vainly to free his hand from his great-grandmother's steel grab.

“A man who feigned to be a knight, when he was only a very tall and very stupid dude,” Rohanne Lannister sighed, increasing the speed of her steps. “Like his intractable grandson and his never ending hair of straw, but forget my words if you want him to be your father-in-law, Jaime.”

Jaime was too busy in keeping her frantic pace amidst the crowd to think to an adequate reply. He felt immediately better when he saw his mother, surrounded by a court of otters, having a cuddle party at the feet of the panoramic lift that promised to the visitors a 360 degrees view of the steeples, the towers and the characteristic slate roofs of the historical buildings mixed to the glass and steel of futuristic buildings emerging from the maze of alleys around the old harbor of Lannisport.

“Go and let the Sea Lady hear you roar, Jaime”, great-grandma Rohanne told to the stunned boy, before letting his hand. The elevator doors opened and he followed his mother and few of the otters inside. Jaime had a glimpse of his father, before the doors closed, and it seemed to him that the Prime Minister was smiling, thumbs up. How odd. Johanna was smiling too, and her cheeks were of a lovely pink, like it happened when she was concerned or excited or both.

“Ready, my brave boy? Oh, I know you're ready and Brienne's mother is good and kind, I just want you to know we'll be at your side whatever decision you'll make”, she said as the lift came to the first and last stop, 120 feet high.

They were welcomed by a cool breeze on the panoramic terrace and by the Lady's perfume. Jaime felt a bit dizzy when he realized the blue cloak wrapping the Aquarium and half the city was only the Lady's dress, alive and frothing, where hundreds or thousands whales, giant octopuses and fishes of any kind and species danced and spun, losing their shape then regaining it, beautiful like spring water.

He stepped forward, and the Lady tilted graciously her head, that was some dozens feet higher than the lift itself. She was incredibly tall, even taller than the wench's father, and that was weird, but lovely, in a way, lovely like the freckles which took fire on her skin as she moved, her forehead crowned by white pearls, by corals bright like her loose hair and by the gold of the sunlight. She was the most enchanting Lady he had ever seen but Brienne had more freckles.

“You must be Jaime”, the Lady said, her voice sweet like the echo imprisoned in a shell.

“Hello. You're Brienne's mother?”, he answered, looking into the Lady's sapphire eyes.

“Yes, I am. Thank you, Jaime, thank for having saved my daughter.”

“Is she all right?”

“She is.” The lady opened her porcelain hand and Brienne was there, curled inside a bubble, eyes closed, maybe dreaming. She seemed healthy and yellow and blue and so little, all in the same time. “You know, Jaime, Brienne is only half a human, she's a sea creature, like me.”

“I know.”

“She wanted to be a human, for you. She turned into a mermaid and then into a child for you, tasting your blood. Requires a true knight, willing to accept her, fish or mermaid or girl, can you understand it?”

Jaime nodded, his mother's hand warm and comforting on his shoulder.

“And you're ok with it?”

“Yes.”

“But Brienne had been chosen as my heir among all my children and that can't be changed. Not even by me.”

Jaime tried to swallow, in vain. His throat had gone dry like a dornish dune. “She had changed me twice. Maybe she can do it for a third time. If she wants me, well, to change me, if Brienne...”

“Shhh. Ok, Jaime.” The lady smiled, and it was blinding. “Why don't you ask her? Wake up, Brie, there's Jaime here for you.”

“Jaime?”, Brienne rubbed her eyes with those ridiculous fins of her, and Jaime grinned, until he noticed the ugly scar covering half of her face. “Jaime!”

“His name's Jaime, yes, my little sea star. Looks like Jaime has accepted you. Would you accept him and accept to lose your magic to become a human?” Brienne blushed and nodded, more than once. “So it's done and what's done cannot be undone, nor underwater, nor on the nude soil.” Looking a bit sad, the Lady turned again towards the golden-haired boy. “I entrust my daughter to you, Jaime”

“I swear you... everything. Thank you, Brienne's mother. Thank you”, he muttered, his feet already jumping on the terrace tiles. “It's great, Brienne's coming home with me, mom. I-I... Brienne, are you happy?”

The shy regal tang smiled, looking a bit confused.

“Go, my sea star, go and pledge your oath”, said the Lady, her flaming hair floating in the sky or in the sea, Jaime couldn't say, Jaime couldn't even breath when the small bubble came close to him, so close to stumble into his nose and pop, _with a loud POP!_ , Brienne's lips brushing for an instant his lips, Brienne... again the plain girl, all crooked teeth and shyness, that has grown on him... Dressed, for a change, with a cute blue dress, almost blue like her eyes.

  
  


“And what are we going to do together?”, asked Brienne, yawning in the sunset light.

“There's a world of noble quests waiting for us! I'll teach you how to use a sword, not a real one, a plastic one, but you'll love it.”

“Brienne loves swords”, she commented, her pale lashes fluttering shut.

“I'll teach you everything, even to speak decently. But you have to promise a thing, Brienne.”

“Ok,” she whispered, drowsy.

“I'm serious, wench,” Jaime lowered his voice, hiding himself beyond an Aquarium map because he didn't needed his mother to know what he was plotting. “Since your Lady mother has said that we have to spend together at least a century like terrestrials, and who knows how many century underwater, you have to promise me you'll never become stupid like an adult or, worse, like a teen.”

“Ok.”

“No teen dramas and, most of all, no smooches or all that yuky lovey stuff I really can't stand. Promise me, Brie,” he concluded, but the wench had already surrendered to sleep and reclined her head on his shoulder, catching him off-guard for the umpteenth time of the day.

She was such a Brienne, this Brienne. As the family wagon entered the Lion's Mouth, he filled his nostrils with her smell of salt and driftwood, deciding to let her sleep.

In the end, Jaime had half the eternity to convince the wenchy that romance and kisses were really an absurd thing.

**Author's Note:**

> Fan note. "She was the most awkward of awkward turtles" is a quote from auntie_social's lovely fic "Love isn't a sprint, it's a marathon" that I recently devoured because it's an amazing work.  
> You can find it here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25760932
> 
> Nerd note. I know, in her fish version, Brienne is a blue regal tang and she's ...yellow! That's because she's a very young fish, and young regal tang are yellow, then they grow and become blue :) 
> 
> Nerd note (2). Fishes have no eyelids or eyelashes, it's true, but this work is totally a-scientific. Besides, Brienne is a very special fish, and even Jaime can be special, when it comes to Brienne, so... 
> 
> Fan note (2). Thanks to the amazing TeamGwenee for all her childhood friends AU, and most of all, for Child!Jaime loathing all kind of "lovey stuff" in the fic "Outlaws" (https://archiveofourown.org/works/25095616?view_adult=true)


End file.
